


home grown alligator, see you later

by crocustongues



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Animal Facts (tm), Cat Cafés, Fluff, Getting Together, M/M, Suga works with animals!, background kiyoyachi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-01
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-11-07 16:00:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17963651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crocustongues/pseuds/crocustongues
Summary: To be fair, coming to the cat café was all on him, and Koushi’d agreed with that pleasant smile he always wore. It’s miraculous how they find so much time to spend together when Koushi’s out picnicking with bears or dancing with lions or whatever it is he does—Tooru’s still not entirely sure what Koushi’s job entails, even after all this time—while Tooru spends most days in the starched arms of his navy blue blazer in the heart of the city, fighting cases, which are, in his defence, as ferocious as any animal in the wild.





	home grown alligator, see you later

**Author's Note:**

> hello! before you start this fic i would like to list the animals and things that appear such that if u are squeamish or anything u can skip it! there are: cats, tigers, spider (singular, and non-graphic for i am afraid), birds (crows specifically), killer snails, monitor lizards, a shark-shaped submersible, snails again, cats again (bookends!)
> 
> anyway so the prompt for this was oisuga cats that masha suggested over 5 months ago so u know i am a sham
> 
> also the facts tm in this fic are correct to my knowledge but if u know otherwise pls let me know we are Here for Knowledge thanks!!

“…funny how most of the light that falls on earth doesn’t touch the low-lying shrubs and vines? That’s likely why we didn’t see a _tiger_ crouching by bushes…”

Tooru’s going to be honest, he’s stopped listening to how much solar energy really reaches the vibrant plant-life in the heart of the Amazon, as much as he finds Koushi’s tales fascinating and insightful. He can only just about handle the tabby pawing purposefully at his knee, let alone the story of the tiger Koushi’s probably battled bare-handed and emerged victorious to tell the tale of.

To be fair, coming to the cat café was all on him, and Koushi’d agreed with that pleasant smile he always wore. It’s miraculous how they find so much time to spend together when Koushi’s out picnicking with bears or dancing with lions or whatever it is he does—Tooru’s still not entirely sure what Koushi’s job entails, even after all this time—while Tooru spends most days in the starched arms of his navy blue blazer in the heart of the city, fighting cases, which are, in his defence, as ferocious as any animal in the wild.

A calico slinks up to their cushiony nook and curls into Koushi’s lap—alongside nineteen hundred others that’ve already made themselves home there—and Koushi, with all the grace of an angel, pets her and continues his story.

Tooru’s still distracted, and honestly, props to Koushi for not calling him out on it, because the little tabby is trying to climb into Tooru’s lap. Tooru’s torn between helping her and letting her succeed on her own merits.

The rest of their, well, _date_ , goes by in a similar fashion, and Tooru has a hard time saying goodbye to the little tabby—whose name, he learns, is Sashimi—and to Koushi, because he knows it’s going to be a long while until he can see either of them again.

“Hey!” Koushi says suddenly, clutching at Tooru’s arm, “Look.”

There’s a sign at the front of the café; an adoption poster for the kittens they’d just hung out with.

“You think Shimizu’d be interested in having a new friend?” Shimizu Kiyoko had been a classmate of Koushi’s and now works in the same firm with Tooru. Except she’s a defence attorney and Tooru has nothing but respect (tinged with just a _smidgen_ of fear) for her. The idea of the serene and composed Shimizu cuddling with the tabby they’d just said goodbye to was a little beyond Tooru’s imagination.

They say goodbye and part ways, and Tooru makes a beeline for the sheaf of papers in his study he has to go through before tomorrow. He makes a face at the papers and tells them, very very seriously, he’s going to deal with them after a hot shower, so they’d best prepare themselves.

They don’t, and Tooru burns through them like a madman on a caffeine high.

 

 

Tooru smiles at the picture Koushi’s sent him, it’s a candid starring a little tabby and himself, having the absolute time of their lives. He puts his phone down and drops his cup of scalding coffee on the floor.

Spider-webs, Koushi had informed him just yesterday, were made of amino acids like glycine and alanine, just like the human body produces them for a myriad of vital functions Tooru can’t possibly recall.

“Fascinating stuff,” Koushi had said.

Funny how none of this comes to mind when he catches one on the kitchen counter and flees to his office in terror, texting his assistant Yachi to please bring him some coffee instead.

 

 

Exactly six weeks later, thanks to Yachi who’d rescheduled his meetings to next Monday, he’s here at the cat café, drinking a strawberry milkshake, and petting the tabby who hasn’t forgotten him. She’s a little bigger now, and Tooru’s so incredibly proud, he doesn’t even mind the claws digging into his thigh as she climbs into his lap.

Koushi’s talking about the bird flight patterns—it’s riveting, he _swears_ , it’s about _mobbing_ and _crows_ —but the tabby, whose name Tooru remembers is Sashimi, is being her cute little self, and suddenly Tooru wonders if Sashimi would like this to be a full-time job.

Koushi’s looking at him now, a small smile playing at his lips, like he knows what Tooru’s thinking. He might as well know, since Tooru’s already half-convinced Koushi is a telepath, too, on top of all his other accomplishments. It’s a stain on his impeccable facade, really, Tooru scolds himself half-heartedly, that he can’t keep up pretenses with Koushi. 

As it were, Tooru is a man of his word, and that word happens to be indecision, so Sashimi is left behind when Tooru leaves later that evening with a head full of strange thoughts about wing feathers. It’s very strange, Tooru thinks, that Koushi finds it so _easy_ to share his life, yet Tooru knows next to nothing about his work. It’s not for lack of trying (or presence of cats), it’s just that Sugawara Koushi is like a novel with too many scribbled notes in the margin to be deemed legible. On the other hand, Tooru speaks as little about his own work—it’s particularly technical, when politics comes into play, and he doesn’t quite know to explain jargon like Koushi does. However, at the end of the day, it must be admitted, he finds killer snails in his papers, atoms rearranged to make that little doodle of a _Conus aulicus_ that Yachi Hitoka asks about timidly one Thursday evening.

He tells her about them, obviously, and he feels less terrible about not articulating the little miracles they are, because Yachi is a good assistant and an even better listener. They end up watching tiny marine snails live their best lives on the internet, piles of paperwork to filed abandoned without second thought. When the thought finally arrives, late at night when he’s all alone, as second thoughts are wont to do, he sees them in his phone screen when checking the time—dark eyes, glittering and bottomless and opaque. 

They’d been talking about bees that day.

 

 

Tooru likes the summer. He likes it best from inside his air-conditioned apartment, where he isn’t directly under the sweltering sun, puffing out breaths so warm he’d like to stop breathing entirely, please and thank you.

Therefore, it makes no sense when he replies to Koushi on Saturday evening that he’d be pleased to honour him with his presence on Sunday and trek the day away, smack in the middle of July.

He arms himself with insect repellent and a large hat, and packs his bag full of things the internet said would come in handy, including (but not limited to)—an umbrella, an extra pair of socks, and Iwa-chan’s binoculars from when they were seven and enthusiastic about everything.

Koushi’’s waiting for him at the mouth of the trail, and Tooru’s glad he got here on time, congratulating himself for finishing his stack of paperwork with minutes to spare on his hair. They walk in companionable silence, enjoying the not-quite-yet oppressive late summer morning. Koushi folds first, pointing out a butterfly or two, names and facts rolling off his tongue effortlessly. 

Koushi offers his hand around every sharp bend and rocky rabbit-path, and Tooru waves it away every time, conscious of the dull ache in his knee. It turns into a needling pain sometime around noon, and Tooru falls back, squinting into the distance under the glinting summer sun.

And Koushi, as if by miracle, as if he knows, comes upon a clearing just then, where he asks—ever grandiose, ever charming, ever composed—if Tooru would do him the honour of lunching with him this fine Sunday.

Tooru, for all his flaws, is mortal after all, and cupid’s arrow goes straight through his heart.

 

 

A few days later, while munching on his egg sandwich, he scrolls through hundreds of pictures of monitor lizards, thinking about how he saw one a few days ago, and how Koushi had made friends with it so easily, feeding him little pieces of his own lunch, gently breaking down its walls with every piece.

It feels like a dream, that day, and the interconnectedness of everything fascinates Tooru no end. That he, Koushi, the monitor, Yacchan, little Sashimi, and even Tetsu-chan from Media are all part of the same family, all great-great-great—he doesn’t even know how many more _greats_ —grandchildren of the same single-celled slime that crawled out of the sea one day. A statistical improbability so large, it’s positively absurd. And yet, here they are, and the chaotic absurdity of it all makes Tooru want to laugh giddily.

He goes back to his casefiles not long after, and he finds that the world is a smaller place than he’d imagined, that the sentences strung together in his reports are all the same as the words that make up the _iTunes terms & conditions_ dialogue box and the DNA of an apple.

 

 

When he puts it down on paper, it seems almost laughably obvious to Tooru that despite being two very busy adults with full-time job, they still find time for each other’s company, and are very clearly interested in each other. Yet in practice, their relationship is a work in progress. One dinner goes from this Saturday to next Tuesday to the Sunday after that, and is altogether postponed indefinitely until Koushi returns from the depths of whatever jungle has ensnared his heart.

A Saturday the next month is The Day, and Tooru badgers Yachi with questions about meatballs and casseroles during lunch, and she’s saved by none other than Shimizu Kiyoko, who tells him Koushi likes shrimp and he likes it _spicy_. Tooru cries inwardly.

While he knows birds don’t mind the spice, Tooru does, and incredibly so. He cooks the shrimp to the best of his ability and waits for it to cool and rethinks his decision to buy this many chilli peppers he’s never ever going to use. He tries not to think about another, hypothetical meal he could make for another, hypothetical dinner.

Tooru finds Koushi in the middle of his workday—one that involves not studying permacultures in ponds but rather answering the 63,194 emails in his inbox.

"I hate answering emails," Koushi explains sheepishly, having caught Tooru's jaw falling open in shock. "I'd rather have a stomach parasite slowly dissolve my insides than answer another one."

Tooru, whose job revolves around emails and their replies, dies a little. Something good comes of this noble sacrifice, since they spend a good hour prioritising emails and typing out niceties and at the end of it all, Koushi finds the archive button to be his new best friend.

Koushi thanks him, and he thanks him a little louder when he takes a look at what Tooru’s brought him, and Tooru thinks, just maybe, all those chilli peppers were worth it.

Just then, as Koushi rambles about paperwork, Tooru spots something on the table, something that demagnetises his heartbeat—he sucks in a breath and holds it between his breastbones, counting one, two, three.

It’s a book titled _Litigation for Losers_ , and Tooru knows that book far too well, having written the foreword several months ago in a coffee-induced state of productivity.

It’s a little detail, and he doesn’t miss it, but it causes his thoughts to whirlwind, the unfinished-ness of this _thing_ he has with Koushi piling up a giant evidence against his ventricles.

Koushi’s stopped his chatter and it dawns on Tooru entire minutes later that he’s staring at the book, as if his eyes could shoot out some type of toxin that could explain this feeling in his chest. It feels wrong that Koushi’s looking at him, knowing and familiar, and it shoots little circuits up and down the length of his spine.

He’s waiting, Tooru realises, and his eyes land on a model submersible, ornate and delicate, in the shape of a shark that looks like it’s saying _go for it, Tooru!_

 _I’m trying, Shark-chan!_ He tells the mini submersible telepathically.

Finally, he turns to Koushi, meeting his eyes, and he says it, after months and months of not saying it:

“You’re...really something else, aren’t you? I’ve never met anyone like you.”

And to tell the truth, Tooru wonders if he’ll ever meet anyone willing to spend hours with an impatient and snarky lawyer and teach him what the word _selachii morphology_ means, and then go home and read a book on law for amateurs.

Koushi says, lightly, this is why he likes hanging out with Tooru, for all the genuine flattery.

To be honest, Tooru knows Koushi’s concerns mirror his own. He’s afraid of the same pitfalls as anyone else--the fear that this connection is shallow at best and will fizzle out the second either of them looks away for a second. It’s hard, Tooru admits, to think of it like that.

He takes Koushi’s hand and sits there, feeling like the type species of synanthropic snail, hoping to have a Sugawara Koushi sit down next to him and tell him about the courtship ritual of the Hercules beetle.

And then:

Koushi tightens his grip, and he smiles again, something that splits his face in two, and its sincerity would’ve knocked Tooru off-balance had he been standing. 

The amniotic quality of a promised about to be forged is shattered by Koushi’s phone, which rings like a nightingale about to take flight, and Tooru listens to Koushi tell the mycologist on the phone he’s _busy over the weekend, so could they do whatever it is next week?_

“Where are you going over the weekend?” Tooru asks.

“To dinner. With a serial flatterer,” Koushi says with a wink, “Who has yet to tell me about the woes of courthouse battles.”

And Tooru feels the windfalls of science fall into his lap.

He takes that back when he’s tearing up half an hour later over dinner, and he curses the science that had made Sugawara Koushi far too powerful as he laughs at Tooru’s complete inability to eat his own chilli-shrimp abominations.

 

 

That weekend, they find themselves at the cat cafe, and Tooru finds that Koushi and Shimizu get on like a house on fire, and he witnesses something he never thought he’d see. Sashimi, the little kitten who’d charmed him so, had managed to charm Shimizu and Yachi, and was now contentedly sleeping in Yachi’s arms, about to head to her new home. Tooru’s excited to see new pictures of Sashimi on Monday, as Yachi’s pinky-promised him seriously.

The wondrous unfolding of existence hums in his mind and he waves goodbye to Yachi and Shimizu and Sashimi, his fingers entwined loosely with Koushi’s.

**Author's Note:**

> yes i referenced the infamous courtship ritual of the hercules beetle by kittebasu what of it
> 
> some facts that're relevant:  
> \- i don't think japan has monitor lizards but my friend sees a lot of them on his treks & i naturally Had To include them sorry for the inauthentic detail )-:  
> \- selachii morphology is the study of elasmobrachs (OR SHARKS BASICALLY. I LOVE THEM!!!)  
> \- synanthropic snails are actually common! they're here for human meddling & Down for a Good Time  
> \- this is a call out for my friend who a) doesn't answer his emails ever and b) can name butterflies just by glancing at one from a few feet away like a wizard of some kind
> 
> i didn't think i would finish this fic when i started it and i'm so glad i did!! so pls leave me validation to escape from mother gothel's tower it is almost hay fever season and the dungeon is filled with hay Only.
> 
> find me on twt: @floralsonnets or on tumblr: @gulabijamuns
> 
> (thank u bread & beewachan for beta-ing this ;-; and stacy & hope for inspiring the ending!!)


End file.
